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Sunday, 31 August 2014

I have noticed this summer that we only seemed to have one pair of Purple Martins that stayed around and successfully raised a chick in one of our Saguaros and I was curious as to why, in a year that has seen apparently great rearing success amongst most other bird species why they hadn't done so well. I think I may have found the culprit.

The Brown-crested Flycatchers have chosen to use the same group of Saguaros as the Purple Martins to nest this year and they are known to be particularly aggressive during nesting season, often driving other bird species away. Such a shame, I do so enjoy having the martin families swirling around over head with their beautiful warbling calls.

Wednesday, 27 August 2014

It seems to have been an exceptionally good year for the bird populations around our land, everywhere I look there are the avian equivalent of gawky teenagers. They are no longer sweet little chicks but they have a ways to go before they look like their parents. The entertainment factor is pretty high watching all their goofy antics.

Wednesday, 20 August 2014

I posted a couple of months back about a mysterious hole that appeared in our yard, we put one of our wildlife cameras nearby and discovered we had a badger around. It seems that he was just passing through and this was the last shot we got of him, a couple of weeks ago. Happy travels little guy, I hope you come back some day. We like having you around.

Sunday, 17 August 2014

The White-winged Doves will be starting to fly south soon and things will become more orderly at the bird feeders. Every time I see them hitting the feeders and scattering seed everywhere, or chasing all the other birds off I have to remind myself that they do some good by scattering the seeds from the Saguaro fruits. I guess they should be called the seed-scattering dove!

We have a small piece of land nestled up against the mountains and this blog is a pictorial record of what occurs there. My only rule, if it doesn't take place on our land - it doesn't get on the blog.